The Dissemblers Book

The Dissemblers is the story of a woman searching for greatness and beauty, only to find that neither greatness nor beauty are exactly what she thought. Ivy Wilkes always assumed she would achieve greatness as a painter. She moves to Santa Fe in search of the light and landscape that inspired her idol, Georgia O'Keeffe. At first, Ivy embraces life in the artsy desert town, working in the O'Keeffe museum by day and spending her evenings with Omar, the seductive cousin of her upstairs neighbors. But when Ivy's own painting stagnates, she finds herself paralyzed by the fear that she will never paint anything of worth. Unable to create anything original, she begins imitating Georgia O'Keeffe's work and is enticed by an offer to create O'Keeffe forgeries to sell on the black market. The paintings sell, but Ivy's secrets isolate her from those she loves. When a mysterious man appears at the museum, asking questions about O'Keeffe forgeries, Ivy's bonds of love and friendship are tested. In her struggle to find her own artistic voice, she navigates the space between pride and guilt, love and selfishness, with devastating consequences. Rendered in concentrated prose, The Dissemblers explores themes of isolation and misunderstanding. The emotions are subtle, and the characters continually thwart their own best intentions and harbor mutually exclusive desires.

Publishers Weekly

A young painter finds herself in over her head when she begins a career in art forgery in Campbell's mediocre debut. After graduating from art school, Ivy Wilkes moves to Santa Fe, N. Mex., gets a position at the Georgia O'Keeffe museum gift shop, and begins painting O'Keeffe replicas to hone her skills. Upon seeing the canvases, her neighbor, Maya, implausibly reveals that she's a dealer of art forgeries. After some mild conscience wrestling, Ivy agrees to let Maya sell her work and then, upon learning that one lie makes others come more easily, Ivy begins having an affair with Maya's boyfriend (in addition to sleeping with his cousin). The web of lies spun around the four begins to unravel when Ivy discovers that Maya hasn't been completely forthcoming, either, and a man shows up at the museum asking questions that threaten to undo the entire crazy operation. Campbell's characters have brief moments of sparkling humanity, but too much of the story is given over to navel-gazing and overphilosophizing. (Oct.)